Someone asked me the other day about day trading simulations, giving me an idea for a post. Hurray!
There are a few options out there. Most brokerage firms that deal with traders offer simulation trading for their customers, but you usually have to open an account to access those features.
More than one trader has gotten started by watching the market fro buy and sell points, entering phantom trades in a spreadsheet, and then calculating performance. It’s not glamourous, but it works.
The Chicago Board Options Exchange offers an online trading game called OptionQuest, if you want to try out options trading. If stocks are more your thing, MarketWatch offers a stock market game and Investopedia has its stock simulator (with a Canadian version, if that suits your needs best).
If you want to compete for real money, you can try the CNBC Million Dollar Challenge. This year’s contest is billed as the fourth annual, but it hasn’t run in consecutive years. There as a nifty scandal a few years back in which some contestants found a bug that let them enter trades after the market closed. That is a little reminder that trading games are not the same as real trading; the rules and the regulators may be a little different, and the stakes change when the bucks are real. Still, it makes a lot of sense to practice before jumping in to real markets.
very helpful tip,..I want to consider myself a scalper mostly the YM,..off course learning every day and find post like this very helpful,..thanks
I use Tradingsim.com. They have a cool online simulator which allows me to trade over 1 years worth of tick data.